Dreams

For a new project, I’m interested in my readers’ most common dreams.

For instance, for a long time, years, I had only one dream. It was a variation on the actor’s nightmare: I was always booked for some kind of performance in some faraway city, and I was always showing up the day of the show and finding out that my housing was bizarrely inadequate (one dream had me staying in a rotting trailer in the middle of a woods), my transportation confusing and dangerous (subway trains without platforms, jet planes that must take off or leave in the middle of city centers), and the venue always in a state of turmoil. And, of course, I was always showing up without a clear idea of what the show was and what my part was in it.

The other dream I’ve had for at least the past twenty years is that I’m showing up at a college campus on finals day and realizing that I’m due to take an exam and haven’t been to any of the classes that semester. In fact, I haven’t even been on the campus before.

I used to have the dream where I showed up at work naked. The strange thing about that one was that no one else ever noticed that I was there, much less that I was naked.

And, in times of great stress, I’d have flight dreams every night. I would have them so often that they became routine, I would know when one was starting and know exactly what to do. I had them so often that my flight-dream life became an easy, comfortable place, and flying became no big deal — I could just as easily fly down the hallway to get to class as soar over my neighborhood in the moonlight.

I’ve had some version of every kind of dream reported in the Wikipedia "Common Themes" paragraph, with the exception of the one with the dreamer’s teeth rotting and falling out.  That one strikes me as bizarre.

Jury duty postscript

The above is the seal of the county of Los Angeles. I saw it yesterday handsomely mounted at the elevator bank outside the jury pool room. My understanding of county seals is probably not all it could be, but to my reckoning, the official mascot of the county of Los Angeles is a Greek lady standing under the sun, by a riverbank, in front of some crazy-ass mountains, holding an armload of produce. But a Greek lady standing under the sun by a riverbank in front of some crazy-ass mountains with an armload of produce is not all Los Angeles County is famous for! No, many other things come from Los Angeles County. Clockwise from left, we can see that Los Angeles County is famous for its oil wells, the Hollywood Bowl (where, it appears, a Christian service is held under the stars), cows, fish, Spanish Armadas, and drafting supplies.

As it happens, the above is the old county seal. Below is the new one.

As you can see, Los Angeles County still considers itself, first and foremost, a place where a woman in loose-fitting clothes stands under the sun, by a riverbanks, in front of some crazy-ass mountains, with an armload of — something. The woman has gone from Greek to Mexican, I think, which is probably a step in the right direction. But she’s not holding sheaves of whatever-it-is anymore. To tell you the truth, I’m not sure what the new woman is holding, but there doesn’t seem very much of it. Perhaps that’s just another sign of budget cuts. What is that stuff in her bowl anyway? Olives? Rocks? Tar, from the world-famous La Brea Tarpits?

And we can see that the bounty of Los Angeles County has changed as well. No more oil wells in Los Angeles County, Charlie! They’re gone! And no more Christian services at the Hollywood Bowl either! You know what we have here instead? Spanish Missions, that’s what! They’re all over the place, now that the oil wells are gone! Cows and fish are still in plenty of abundance, thankfully, and our Spanish Armadas are still as common as ever. And no one, it appears, will ever take away Los Angeles County’s primacy in drafting supplies.

Liveblogging jury duty!

My time is up. I must serve my jury duty this week. I write to you from the jury pool room in the county courthouse in Inglewood.

The way jury duty works in Los Angeles county is this: you are bound to clear your schedule for five business days. If you don’t get put on a trial on the first day, you can go home and not have to come back for a year or more. However, if you get chosen to serve, you have to expect the trial to last three to five days.

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